


And Action!

by RaeSone99



Category: NCIS
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-17
Updated: 2013-04-17
Packaged: 2017-12-08 18:13:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/764451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RaeSone99/pseuds/RaeSone99
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I typed this up a few days ago, but I thought maybe I should post it now before "Berlin" blows it to smithereens haha<br/>Ziva goes off the grid chasing Bodnar. Tony goes after her in a last attempt to bring her back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And Action!

Tony entered the dim warehouse. In the middle of the rusting ship hulks a lamp hung down lighting the straw strewn floor like a rebel moon. Tony crept closer making sure to stay in the shadows, his gun in front of him always. The air was filled with the low hum of electricity and punctuated by the occasional groan from Bodnar. Tony sped up. It wasn’t that he was so gung-ho on saving the murderer but he _was_ motivated to stop one Special Agent Ziva ‘Never Killed Feloniously’ David. Within seconds his feet carried his ears within range to hear the intense cadence of Ziva’s voice speaking in Hebrew. Tony slowed down once again, listening intently behind a ship’s motor. It crossed his mind that the years of learning her native tongue had really paid off in the last month or so.

“And so it has come to this…”

Tony’s heartbeat slowed, which he thought was crazy considering the danger they were both in, that she was putting herself in. Even though Ziva was about a minute away from killing Bodnar as an act of revenge and landing herself in prison till the sun burned out he felt at peace, good, right. After days of searching through Baltimore for any hints of her, days of exorcising his worry by irritating McGee, and nights where his subconscious played out all of the horrible scenarios he refused to think of during the day, they’d found her. It hadn’t looked so good after Bodnar gave them the slip in Berlin. Ziva, blinded by grief and rage, ignored Gibbs, Vance, and SecNav’s orders to stand down, tracking Bodnar down to Tony’s old stomping ground. He’d say it was a coincidence but… He shook his head trying to focus, and then quickly ran his fingers over his hair self-consciously.

Outside were three teams of SWAT, FBI and to his oh so immense joy, the CIA. Fornell had been all for just rushing the place casualties or no but Tony managed to convince Gibbs, who in turn convinced Fornell, to let Tony try to get everyone out alive. Fornell stared at him hard for a moment before gruffly shoving a walkie in Tony’s chest and walking off.

Stuffing the walkie in his suit jacket Tony faced Gibbs who had simply given him a silver eyed stare and nod. So now here he was; feet away from Ziva, feeling oddly calm, movie lines flitting through his mind for his dramatic entrance.

*click*

The blood drained from Tony’s face, and without pomp or circumstance he walked around the motor. In the weak lamplight Bodnar physically looked terrible. Both eyes were swollen shut, his jaw had a few lumps, and something about his nose reminded Tony of cubism…really the only things unharmed were his ears. Standing with her back towards Tony, Ziva had the shot lined up. Despite looking much better than Bodnar Tony knew she was one bullet way from broken. Her shoulders were too high, her back muscles too tight, even the angle of her head tilt was wrong. He was sure that if she turned around she’d have a bright eyed crazy-Mossad stare going on. Tony lowered his gun a fraction and felt his other hand reach out towards her of its own free will.

“Ziva,” he called to her low and urgent.

Her head whipped towards him. To both their credit the gun did not.

“Tony?” Confusion danced in her eyes, and something like relief informed the lines on her face for an instant before hardening again once she understood the implications of his sudden appearance.

“Gibbs?” she asked tersely.

“With Fornell,” he replied, “and a few of our friends from the CIA...”

Ziva frowned. Tony holstered his weapon; still mindful of hers pointed at Bodnar.

“Ziva,” he called again. Her eyes snapped back to his as she bridled at the mild reproach in his tone.

“What did you expect Tony? That I would let my father’s death go unpunished?” Tony took a deliberate step towards Ziva, so much so that she almost looked amused.

“I think he looks punished enough already, Ziva. How many teeth did you knock out? Three? Four? That’s unfortunate. I’m not sure Mossad covers his dental anymore…”

Two more steps. She ignored his questions knowing them full well as distractions.

“I am not a suspect Tony. You do not need to approach me as though I am one.”

“Maybe…Maybe not, but you’re not exactly operating within official NCIS capacity are you?”

Ziva glanced at Bodnar’s now unconscious body before turning back to Tony. When she spoke again she sounded saddened, “There is…no way Gibbs or Vance simply lets me back onto the team.”

Tony stopped a full two feet away, surprise curdling his stomach, “Back? You handed in papers of resignation?” They both heard the implied ‘without telling me?’

“No,” she replied a shade too loudly, “But I think after this,” she waved her Sig in Bodnar’s general direction, “it is implied.”

 Relief trickled through him, “Ziva,” he smiled, and she narrowed her eyes at him as though questioning his sanity; which only made him smile even more broadly because the crazy Israeli-American chick with the bruised and bloodied ex-deputy director of Mossad at her feet was questioning _his_ sanity!

“Unless you filed your GS-13 you are still acting in the full capacity of an NCIS agent, albeit one who didn’t share her lead but I think Gibbs has a rule covering that.” They both smirked at that. No doubt this was stretching “Your lead, your case’ to its breaking point. A strangely comfortable silence followed, considering the circumstances.

“Tony.”

“Ziva.”

He deferred.

“Tony…”she hesitated before rushing on, “I do not know if I _can_ stop.”

 He nodded understanding. The Mossad part of her that had been asleep for so long was awake, in high gear, and craving Bodnar’s life like an angry deity would a sacrifice. He remembered how in the early days Gibbs wouldn’t even let her take down a suspect for fear she might ‘slip’. It was Mossad Ziva vs. NCIS Ziva and in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Harvey Dent and Two-Face, Jennifer Walters and She-Hulk fashion she herself was unsure which would win.  Holding her eyes Tony decided to speed up the process. Arms held apart from his body he stepped between Bodnar and Ziva’s gun.

Ziva recoiled.

“Tony!” she said sharply, “Get away from there!”

“No,” he said, still calm. He could only hope that when they made the movie of his life the writers gave his character something cooler to say.

 He walked into the barrel of her gun knowing she’d be able to feel and see that he didn’t have a vest on. Sure enough, her eyes widened and her lips parted a bit before tightening, pressing into a thin line of anger.

“Tony, do not make me do this.”

Her anger ignited his own, “If by ‘this’ you mean shoot me, then yeah you’re going to have to; especially if you’re going to throw our lives away over this idiot.”

Ziva shook her head, “I would not be throwing our lives away if _you_ just let me shoot him! Then this whole mess would be over.”

Tony sneered at her derisively, “Over? No, no, my ninja, it would just be starting. We’d have to go on the run from the alphabet soup. If we’re lucky maybe Gibbs is the one who catches us, and maybe we get a trial and not DOA.” He pressed into the gun harder, the barrel burning through his shirt. “But maybe that’s how you want it? Dead!” He practically spat. Ziva flinched but didn’t back down, which he took as a good sign because that meant there was still some hope.

“Maybe I would!” She shouted and Tony blinked at the sudden déjà vu. The words poured out of her, “Maybe that way I would not have to wake up knowing that everyone who loved me was dead. Gone Tony! My mother, Ari, Tali…my father! There is no one left! Only me...” She finished with what would have been a sob on any other woman, and for any other woman Tony would have backed off. But no. He was Tony, and she was Ziva. That didn’t stop the hurt though.

“‘There’s no one left?’ Then what,” he hissed, “do you call Gibbs? What do you call McGee?” His voice rose louder with each name, “Palmer, Ducky, and Abby?” And here it was; the moment that their dance ended. He saw her entire body daring him to say it, here, now, with his life on the line, to her face. He lowered his voice as if it was just them. They were the only two that mattered. Not the CIA, FBI, SWAT, or NCIS, and certainly not Bodnar; only them.

“What do you call me, if everyone who loves you is gone?” He wished he could say she looked shocked or pleased but she seemed to have frozen. Which if it was even possible made him even angrier, and his next words came out as poison.

“But you know what? If you think what Eli gave you was love? If you think even for a minute that he wasn’t just using you to do his dirty work?” Tony turned slightly and pointed behind him to the previously forgotten Bodnar. “If you kill Bodnar then the only three people who could have ruined Eli David’s legacy are out of the picture. That’s not love Ziva, that’s tying up loose ends.”

Ziva came out of her daze long enough to murmur, “Three?”

Tony’s anger and bluster evaporated at her soft confusion. He quirked a smile at her, “Well, yeah. You… me… and Bodnar.”

Her eyes jerked up to his from his chest. She ignored the movie reference and instead said, “You?”

Tony shrugged, “You already know that I can’t live without you.” He reached out and brushed the side of her face with his hand.

Ziva’s shoulders lowered, loosing whatever twisted tension had fueled them. His thumb brushed underneath her eye. It was dry but that didn’t fool him for one second.

“Besides,” he murmured, trying to make her laugh, “Gibbs may let Abby ‘disappear’ me if we don’t walk out of here together.”

“Well…” she let out an exhausted ‘ha’, before stepping backwards, and holstering her gun in one swift movement, “I would not want that.”

Walking past him she snagged the handcuffs out of his back pocket. Tony rubbed his chest while she read the unconscious Bodnar his rights before cuffing him.

“You know that really hurt,” he complained reaching inside his jacket for the walkie.

“Special Agent DiNozzo,’ a voice demanded, “Is it all clear?”

Tony cringed, he’d been hoping for Gibbs or Fornell when he turned this thing on. The sliminess of the head CIA suit seemed to coat the walkie itself.

“All clear... Subject has been apprehended,” Tony turned to face a too close Ziva. “Special Agent David has also been successfully recovered.”

There were sounds of a struggle over the static and then, “Ziver?”

Ziva placed her hand over Tony’s and stepped closer, pulling the walkie to her mouth “Yes, Gibbs. I am here.”

Tony doubted whether anyone not on the team would have been able to hear the relief that colored her voice and he knew they couldn’t see how she looked at him as she said, “We are fine.”

Tony’s brain stammered as she squeezed his hand briefly just in case he’d missed her double meaning.

“Good. Let’s go home,” Gibbs’ voice crackled off.

Tony turned off the walkie carefully and Ziva’s hand dropped to her side. She’d dropped her eyes to the ground.

“Hey,” he tilted his head until he found her eyes, “We’re okay, remember? We’ll be home soon. Actually, I’ve got your magazines in the car…”

Ziva stared at him, “You did not believe that I would kill him?”

Tony shrugged, “You’re an NCIS agent first, although it did look iffy there for a while,” he rubbed the imprint from her Sig’s muzzle, which he was sure would bruise and told her as much. A smile graced her face. It looked like her first real one in days. She placed her hand over his heart, “I missed you.”

He just looked at her, visually drinking her in. That’s how Fornell found them: her hand over his heart, their eyes dancing. Fornell gave them wide berth as though the emotions were contagious, but Tony still heard him grumbling, “The man must be blind,” as he dragged Bodnar away.

Soon enough they were the only ones left. Silence and then, “I’m so tired, Tony.”

Immediately he opened his arms and she stepped into his embrace and held him tightly to her. His hands spanned her back and her grip around him was just as sure. He could feel her chest rise and fall against his. He buried his face in her neck and exhaled softly. As tightly as they were holding each other he felt her shiver. Her breath came as a whisper just beneath his ear and he felt as much as heard her say, “Thank-you,”

“For what?”

“For reminding me,” she pulled back a few inches to leave a ghost of a space between them so her chocolate eyes could mesh with his hazel ones, “that I am not alone,” she pronounced the words carefully as though afraid, irrationally, her English would fail her.

He felt his eyes crease with softness, and he knew they were breaking every rule, both Gibbs and their own unspoken ones.

“Ziva…” his voice was so low it was more suggestion than anything else. He inhaled to break the final rule when she captured his lips in a kiss. His response was instantaneous. His right hand dropped to her lower back and his left hand rose to tangle in her hair. He couldn’t help himself…but then she didn’t seem to mind either considering the way her hand was clutching him to her or the way she whispered his name before their lips found each other again. He wondered if that was his heartbeat her hers beating so raggedly.

She was kissing him. But as the kiss turned softer and sweeter, the wistfulness of it broke his heart. Even as he was holding her in his arms it was just for the moment. Outside reality was waiting. Ziva, feeling the shift in his body, broke away and leaned her forehead against his. Their breathing slowed as they reveled in half a decade of unspoken love come to fruition. Suddenly Ziva’s shoulders began to shake, and for a second he was afraid it had all been too much, only to hear her laugh softly. He found himself smiling despite himself, “What? What is it?”

“I am wondering how long it takes Gibbs to see through us.” Electricity zinged through his body at the word ‘us’.

“I don’t know but I don’t think I can go back to the way it was before…maybe you _should_ have killed Bodnar just so we’d have more time.”

 Ziva pulled back and looked at him sharply before seeing the mirth in his eyes. He winced expecting a head slap. Instead he felt the soft pull of her lips against his. His eyes widened in surprise and pleasure. A short while later they broke apart, breathless.

“Careful Special Agent David, I could get used to this... You know next time maybe I should go off the deep end, so you can save me?”

 This time she did swat him but he could see the love in his eyes reflected in hers as she took his hand and began the walk to the warehouse door and Gibbs. At the entrance Tony stopped her, he had to ask,

“This isn’t the end is it?”

She grinned mischievously at him, “We have not yet begun.”

 He smiled back wholeheartedly feeling a little giddy. Outside, Gibbs took one look at them and turned to the car with little more than a, “Good job Ziva…Tony. Keep it out of the office.”

With that vague endorsement they hopped into the car and sped away from the warehouse, exhausted but excited. They had not yet begun.

**Author's Note:**

> Had a little trouble with the end but I hope it wasn't too OOC.  
> I also have no idea what form NCIS uses for permanent leave, but I couldn't help but wonder if there was a form for rogue agents to fill out...  
> Hope you enjoyed it. Thanks for all the love. Comments welcome!


End file.
